Qualla: Sizewell Nuclear Power Stations

Sizewell Nuclear Power Stations: Introduction

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit CC BY-SA 3.0. There is a black box and a white dome on the Suffolk shingle, separated by a fence and twenty-nine years. The black box is Sizewell A, two Magnox reactors that came online in 1966 and stopped generating in 2006. The white dome is Sizewell B, the single pressurised water reactor that started up in 1995 and remains the newest operating nuclear power station in the United Kingdom. Behind them, the foundations for Sizewell C are being prepared. Three generations of British nuclear technology occupy one beach.

Image: CC BY-SA 3.0

Sizewell Nuclear Power Stations: Sizewell A: The Magnox Era

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Pontificalibus, CC0. Sizewell A was a second-generation Magnox station, the carbon-dioxide-cooled, graphite-moderated reactor type that the UK essentially invented and that powered most of the British nuclear fleet from the late 1950s into the 2000s. The two reactors at Sizewell A came online in 1966...

Image: Pontificalibus | CC0

Sizewell Nuclear Power Stations: Sizewell B: The PWR That Stayed

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Zorba the Geek, CC BY-SA 2.0. Sizewell B was the only pressurised water reactor ever built in the United Kingdom. Construction began in 1988, the plant came online in 1995, and it has been generating ever since. A PWR uses ordinary water under pressure to both moderate neutrons and cool the core, a design pio...

Image: Zorba the Geek | CC BY-SA 2.0

Sizewell Nuclear Power Stations: Sizewell C: The Long Approval

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Stavros1, CC BY 3.0. Sizewell C has been on the drawing board for more than a decade. The plant would consist of twin EPR reactors, the same Areva-Framatome design used at Hinkley Point C in Somerset and at Flamanville in France. By May 2013 there were significant public doubts about whether agreemen...

Image: Stavros1 | CC BY 3.0

Sizewell Nuclear Power Stations: What the Beach Has Become

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Pontificalibus, CC0. Sizewell is now one of the densest concentrations of energy infrastructure on the British coastline. The Sizewell A box is being slowly taken apart. The Sizewell B dome is generating. The Sizewell C site is being prepared. Offshore, the cables from East Anglian wind farms are lan...

Image: Pontificalibus | CC0